In my pre-vegan days, I would go 1,000 miles for good mozzarella and buratta cheese. In Puglia, it requires less than 30 km. Laura was good enough one morning to take us to her artisan friend, Giovanni, who makes fresh mozzarella, ricotta and buratta in a small, bright shop, among the stone walls and farm fields in the middle of Puglia.

He graciously demonstrated the technique for turning fresh milk into curds, making curds into cheese, and the cheese into various forms of finished goods, which vary in shape, texture, and with aging — in flavor. Here are a couple of the videos showing his handiwork to stretch the mozzarella, shape it into a ball, and to fill one of those balls with shreds of cheese and some panna (cream) to make buratta.

Finally, you will see in these photos how the professional can make almost any shape imaginable from fresh mozzarella…..

….including cacciocavallo aged for three months with a lemon inside — deliciously fragrant.